“Yes. One of the rioters apparently made a video recording of a ruckus on the bus the night of the riot,” Yu Chin reported. “It appears that there was an undercover policewoman who had been trying to apprehend the victim, right before the driver chased him out of the vehicle and ran him over. But the strange thing is, the police department has no information at all on the identity of that undercover policewoman. It would appear that she is an imposter.”

“This is weird,” Sharon remarked out loud before she caught herself. It was a remark without a purpose.

“They have a video recording. Surely they can ID the imposter?” Elvis raised a brow.

Yu Chin shook his head. “The video clip was shaky and blurry. There’s no way that they can ID the imposter. But the police suspect that the imposter may be the same mysterious girl who made a report about someone taking an upskirt photo of her the same night.”

“Couldn’t they trace the call?” Elvis frowned.

Once again Yu Chin shook his head. “They did. But the young man whom the phone number was registered under claimed that he had lost the mobile phone a few days earlier. So it remains a mystery.”

For a minute Elvis held his chin, lost in thought. Yu Chin stood up and announced that he would go settle the bill for dinner. After Yu Chin left, Sharon looked over at Elvis and said, “There is no point worrying. We should leave the tracking of the girl to the police. That’s their job, isn’t it? Besides, the girl is an unknown factor. It may not even be a good idea to track her down too fast.”

Elvis curled the corner of his lips in a smirk of approval.

“Good point.”

Part Three

Lacerating Tongues

Chapter 7

This was not the first time Hashwini had entertained the fantasy of picking up the ashtray next to the roulette wheel, smacking it down hard onto the Beast’s temple and then admiring the sight of blood dripping down his face onto the colonnades of betting chips.

All the croupiers agreed that the Beast was a nightmare. If Teddy Toy Boy epitomised the angelic high roller at one end of the spectrum where celestial harps played, the Beast stood at the opposite end where he presided over purgatory and made croupiers cross a bridge of knives that stretched over snake pits and fiery rivers.

The first time Hashwini had dealt roulette for the Beast, he had dipped her into a cauldron of boiling hot oil and scarred her badly. It was really her fault. She was careless enough to chortle aloud when she heard him repeatedly chant, “Give me bigly money. I want bigly money, bigly win!”

The Beast looked up from the ball spinning rapidly around the ball track and glared at Hashwini. “What is so funny?”

“I think you meant to say ‘big money, big win’,” Hashwini smiled politely.